Tuesday, May 16, 2006

New federal guidelines ask all females capable of conceiving a baby to treat themselves -- and to be treated by the health care system -- as pre-pregnant, regardless of whether they plan to get pregnant anytime soon.

Among other things, this means all women between first menstrual period and menopause should take folic acid supplements, refrain from smoking, maintain a healthy weight and keep chronic conditions such as asthma and diabetes under control.

And, as Stephen Colbert pointed out on last night's Colbert Report, Fox News' John Gibson on May 11 advised his viewers to get busy making more babies:

Make more babies. That's the lesson drawn out of two interesting stories over the last couple days.

First, a story Wednesday that half the kids under 5 years old in this country are minorities. By far, the greatest number are Hispanic.

Know what that means? Twenty-five years and the majority population is Hispanic.

Why is that? Hispanics are having more kids and others, notably the ones Hispanics call gabachos — white people — are having fewer.

Now in this country, European ancestry people — white people — are having kids at a rate that sustains the population, even grows it a bit.

That compares to Europe where the birthrate is in the negative zone. They're not having enough babies to sustain the population.

...

To put it bluntly: We need more babies. Forget that zero population growth stuff of my poor, misled generation.

Why is this important? Because civilizations need populations to survive.

So far we're doing our part here in America, but Hispanics can't carry the whole load.

The rest of you: Get busy. Make babies.

Or put another way, a slogan for our times: Procreation not recreation.

That's My Word.

(Note that the full context of his remarks is not blatantly racist, as it appeared on The Colbert Report.)